Chapter 78 Chapter Seventy-Seven
Dear Pamela: I'm in a place you've never heard of, doing what I've been doing since I got back to America--namely, convincing all kinds of dumb or confused paparazzi, That's what they should do anyway, if our country is to get the landing craft it desperately needs.
This is the first time I have had the opportunity to write to you, since Rhoda and I have only recently discussed the matter calmly.Since returning home, I have been running around.Besides, Rhoda has a peculiar knack of keeping quiet when in doubt or trouble, and you know I'm not a good talker about such things.
Last week, Brigadier General Olde traveled from New Delhi to Washington to secure more transport aircraft for the Burmese battlefield.He respects Burner-Walker, and he likes you quite a lot.To my great relief, he calls you Pamela.Tudsbury, not Mrs Burner-Walker.So that leads to my big set of words.Rhoda should call me either tonight or tomorrow and explain how she and Peters are doing.Then I can explain it all to you.At the same time, let’s talk about other news about me-since I left Tehran, there have been a lot of such news; first of all, I am now the deputy director of the production department of the Material Procurement Bureau, and also the material and product control commissioner, which means that there is another Anonymous men with military eyes roamed the corridors of Washington institutions.In a nutshell, my job is to be in charge of liaising and solving problems in the industry.
I took the job after I was on track shortly before the landing craft program. So I'm a layman, an itinerant player, with no official status to build or protect. You could say I'm a secretary of the Navy by a specialization My confidant, keeping an eye out for problems, crossing agency boundaries, preventing serious delays. If I'm doing a good job, I don't see any good signs; catastrophic accidents just don't happen anymore.
Our industry has become an astonishing miracle, Pam.We woke up and produced a large number of combat weapons, ships, aircraft, and internal combustion engines, the total of which became the eighth wonder of the world.But it was all makeshift; newcomers were doing new types of work in newly built factories.Temperament is impatient, pressure is great, everyone is very nervous, rushing to work desperately.When there is a conflict of priorities, the whole organization hardens into a fighting stance.The bigwigs were furious, and memos were flying around.
As an engineer and war planner, I knew quite a bit about the landing craft business and the factories and supplies available.I served on all the major wartime committees and usually found a dispute brewing.The hard part was convincing my strict, responsible boss to do what I said.As a minister's favorite, I have no small influence.I seldom have to go to Hopkins, although I do go to him occasionally.The Navy would supply Eisenhower with a staggering number of landing craft, Pamela.Our civilian sector is pampered and ungovernable, but gods, they make stuff.
There is no doubt that I will remain in the production department until the end of the war.In the official race, I fell behind.My fellow students will take part in the remaining battles at sea.The Japanese still have a lot of vitality left, but I have let go of my last chance to go to the blue sea.It doesn't matter.For every good fighter in this war, you need a dozen or three good support people in industrial logistics, or you can't win.
It was already one o'clock in the morning, and old Rhoda didn't call.My plane to Houston leaves at dawn, so I'll put the pen aside.I'll write more tomorrow.
Jeffersonville, Indiana, Jeffersonville Plaza Motor Traveler Hotel March 2, 1944
It's stormy here today.The wind shook the palm trees outside my room, and the rain beat against the windows.The weather in Texas, like its residents, always goes to extremes.However, when the Texans know that (1) you are right, (2) you are serious about business, and (3) you have the strength to negotiate, they will be fine.I haven't heard from Rodana yet, but I expect there will be this evening.
A little more news: Byron was passing through Washington and was on his way to a new job as first officer of a submarine currently being overhauled in Connecticut.He has personally gone through some painful trials.
(The letter recounts Qatar. Esther's sacrifice, and the news of Natalie in Theresienstadt.)
I've got the investigative court records on Esther's sacrifice.The situation was critical for Byron.He gave a very weak testimony for himself.He refused to say that he could not rescue the captain even if he delayed the dive.But the old master sergeant of the submarine summed up the whole story in his testimony.He said: "Maybe Captain Este was wrong in his judgment and he could have survived, but he was right in thinking that the Moray would not have survived that way. He was the greatest man in this war." The captain of the submarine gave the correct order and Mr Henry simply followed his order." This was also the conclusion reached by the court.Forrest proposed posthumously awarding Esther the Medal of Honor, Congress's highest honor.Byron might get a bronze medal, but that wouldn't help his mood much.
Warren's widow returned around Christmas.Rhoda received her.She plans to go back to law school in the fall.She is a beautiful woman with a handsome son, and her life will be happy in the future.Normally she was in high spirits, but when Byron came home she became very depressed.As Byron put on weight, he looked more and more like Warren.This undoubtedly made Janice unhappy.Two or three times Rhoda saw her weeping.Since he left, she's been fine again.
What a sweet boy that Vic was!Delicate and lovely, very thoughtful.He was lively and naughty, but quietly naughty.His mischievous tricks are not random, but like tactics, planned in advance, causing the greatest damage when it is least noticeable.He has a bright future.
Madeleine has finally ditched that grinning, potbellied, glib charlatan I told you about on the radio, saving me from having to whip him, which I meant to do.She currently lives at home, works at a radio station in Washington, and is with an earlier lover, Simon.Anderson kissed.Simon is a first-rate naval officer working here to develop new weapons.She had had a long, tearful conversation with Rhoda last week, asking her if she would tell Simon what happened to the radio guy, and what to say to Simon.I asked Rhoda what opinion she offered.She gave me a funny look and said, "I'll tell her to wait until he asks you." If it had been me, I'd have persuaded Madeleine and Sim to clear things up and start over honestly.It was undoubtedly for this reason that she consulted with Rhoda.
Now the phone is ringing.It should be from my wife.
is her.
it is good.Now, I can go back and tell you what happened last week.On the same day that General Alder let me know that you were not married, we sat down casually after dinner.I said, "Ro, why don't we talk about Huck. Where's Peters?" She didn't care. "Yeah, so why don't we talk, darling? We'd better make a couple of shots of spirits first." Like Rhoda always did, she waited for me to ask her.But she was well prepared for this showdown.
She admitted this relationship, openly saying that it was real, not deviant, but deeply emotional.I take her word for it.Colonel Peters, a "good man beyond reproach," thought her twenty times better than she really was, and in a word, the most perfect woman.Rhoda said it was embarrassing to be so adored, but it was also pleasant and youthful.I asked her point-blank if she would be any happier if she divorced me and married Peters.
Rhoda pondered for a long time before answering this question.Finally, she looked me in the eyes and said, well, she will be happier.She also said that the main reason was that she had already lost my good impression and could not get it back, although I have always been kind and kind.But after having my love for so many years, it sucks to just be tolerated.I asked her what she wanted me to do.She brought up that conversation you had with her in California.I said I do love you very much, but since you're engaged there's nothing more to say.I told her to make up her mind according to her happiest future prospects, and if she wanted me to do something, I would do it.
Apparently, she's been waiting for me to give her the green light to do this.Rhoda was always a little afraid of me.I don't know why, because I feel like I've always been pretty guilt-ridden.Anyway, she said it would take a while.She doesn't need much time either.That's why I'm calling this time.Harrison.Peters couldn't wait to marry her.No problem at all.She has him.She wants to speak to our lawyers in the next two or three days, and then to Peters' lawyers.Peters also wanted to have an open and honest talk with me when I got back to Washington.I might give up the fun.
Well, dear Pamela, I am going free, if by some miracle you will have me.Would you like to marry me?
I'm not a rich man—serve the country and you don't get rich—but we're not poor either.These thirty-one years.I've been saving 1,500 percent of my salary.Since I used to work in the Bureau of Naval Ships and Bureau of Ordnance, I can observe the trends of the industry, so I make good investments and arrangements.Rhoda is also doing well, with a substantial family trust.I'm sure Peters will take good care of her anyway.Am I being too vulgar?I'm very unsophisticated about proposing.This is just my second attempt.
If we do get married, I'll retire early so we can stay together forever.There are a lot of jobs I can do in industry, and I can even come to the UK to work.
If we do have a child or two.I want to get them educated by the church.Is there any problem with this?I know you are a free thinker.I myself don't think life has much meaning, but without faith, there is no meaning at all.Maybe I'll be a stiff, pedantic, surly father when I'm over fifty, but I get on well with little Vic.In fact, at this age I might be spoiling the kids.I'd love to have the chance to try it out!
This is the case!If you are Mrs. Burner-Walker, take this letter from me as a lingering tribute to an impossible and beautiful love affair.If I hadn't happened to book a ticket on the Bremen in 1939—mainly to brush up on my German—I would never have known you.Rhoda and I lived happily ever after, in love with each other, and had no intention of looking beyond.Yet despite the differences in ages, nationalities and backgrounds, and despite the fact that we may have only spent three weeks together in four years, the simple fact is that you seem to be my spouse and I found out almost too late .The little hope of marrying you makes me hold my breath and look forward to a beautiful artistic conception.It is likely that Rhoda has been exploring this beautiful artistic conception outside of our married life, because it does not fully exist.She was a good wife (until she changed her mind), but a dissatisfied one.
In that garden in Persia, you suggested that the whole thing might just be a merry hallucination.I have thought about this for a while.If we seized the rare moments we shared in bed, I might agree.But what have we ever done but talk, and yet we feel that closeness.Indeed, marriage will not be like those tantalizing encounters in faraway lands, where there will be shopping, laundry, housekeeping, mortgages, lawn mowing, arguments, packing and unpacking, headaches, sore throats, and so on. .with you.All this strikes me as a lovely prospect.I don't want anything else.If God gave me this, I'd say -- despite all the troubles in my life and all the trauma -- I'm a happy man, and I'll try to make you happy.
Hope this letter doesn't arrive too late.
With all my love, Pug is writing this letter from Houston Pug on March 3rd while the Battle of Imphal is already underway.Since Burner-Walker's headquarters is no longer located in New Delhi, but at the forward base of Comilla, this letter was not delivered to her until mid-April.At that time, Burner-Walker had disappeared during a flight over the jungle, and the search for him was still ongoing.
Luck plays an important role not only in war, but also in the writing of war journalism and history.Imphal was a British victory that dispelled the dark clouds over the fall of Singapore, and like Alamein was a major decisive battle on a longer front in worse terrain.The RAF did at Imphal what the Luftwaffe had failed to do at Stalingrad: it fed a besieged army from the air for months until they broke through and emerged victorious, which in Unique among modern warfare.However, the D-Day landings and the fall of Rome took place around the same time period, and both events were attended by large groups of journalists and photographers.So at Imphal, in a remote valley near the Himalayas, two hundred thousand people went unnoticed by the press and fought a long series of bloody battles.History continues to ignore Imphal.Of course the dead don't care.The survivors gradually forgot that they were going through the motions unnoticed.
Imphal itself is a "Shangri-La" in real life @. A cluster of local villages surround golden-domed temples, surrounded by high mountains and mountains. It is located in the vast northeastern corner of India, a fertile and beautiful land adjacent to Myanmar. on the plain.The unpredictable situation of the world war made the British and the Japanese fight to the death there.After the British had been ignominiously kicked out of Malaya and Burma by the Japanese in 1942, they had only one objective in Southeast Asia: to save their empire.The attacking Japanese armies halted in front of the majestic mountains that separated Burma from India.Americans from Franklin.Roosevelt went down, not at all interested in this combat goal of the British, thinking that it was backward-looking, unjust, and futile.Roosevelt even told Stalin in Tehran that he wanted to see India free.But the Americans did want to open a corridor in northern Burma so that China could get supplies to continue the war of resistance, and at the same time establish bases along the coast of China to bomb Japan.
The beautiful plains of Imphal are the pivot of such a supply corridor, the gateway to all the mountain passes.The British assembled here and prepared to counterattack.They had no choice but to accept the American strategy.Their commander, a fine soldier named Slim, assembled a large force of mixed British and Asian divisions, and was ordered to advance across northern Burma to join the Chinese forces under General Stilwell of the United States. , thus opening the supply corridor.In response to this action, the Japanese also moved aggressively north to meet Slim.His attractive military build-up provided the opportunity to crush India's defenders with a single counterattack, and then perhaps to drive in, India's radical nationalist Subhas who fell on the Japanese side.Chandra.Under the leadership of Bose, a new Indian puppet government was formed.
The Japanese attacked first, using their old jungle tactics against the British: a quick thrust away from the supply lines and a quick outflank, with troops advancing while taking food and fuel from captured supply heaps.But this time, Slim and his field commander, Skunes, fought bloody battles on the plains of Imphal, beating the Japanese to a standstill and denying them their usual supplies until they starved. , weak, and fled.This took three months.The battle turned into two epic battles - one in which a small force of the British army was besieged in a village called Kohima; the other in which Slim's main force was surrounded by a The battle-hardened, fierce and tenacious Japanese jungle troops surrounded Imphal.
Airlift turned the tide of the two offensive and defensive battles.The British consume more supplies than the Japanese. Japanese soldiers can survive for a certain period of time by eating a bag of rice every day, but American transport planes "airlift hundreds of tons of supplies every day, some of which are unloaded on overburdened airports, and some The aircrew pushed out the open door and dropped it by parachute. Burner-Walker's Tactical Air Command defended the airlift, bombing and strafing the Japanese.
However, the Japanese captured several radar warning stations while surrounding Imphal, and for a while the situation in the air was not rosy.At a meeting in Comilla, Burner-Walker decided to fly to Imphal himself to inspect it.Spitfire squadrons stationed on the plain reported that maintaining air superiority had become a problem without adequate radar warning.Regardless of Pamela's complaints, he flew away alone in a reconnaissance plane.
Burner-Walker was a seasoned pilot, World War I aviationman and career member of the Royal Air Force.His brother's untimely death made him a viscount, but he remained in the army.At this time, he was too old to take part in combat flying, but always took the opportunity to fly alone whenever possible.Mountbatten had already reprimanded him for this once.He liked flying through the jungle alone, though, without the distraction of the co-pilot hanging around and nagging him.It gave him a serenity that was like flying over water, a carpet of lush green that continued for hours below, save for the occasional bend of a sluggish brown river dotted with green islets.The plane zigzags and zigzags among the towering, densely wooded ridges on either side of the wing, passes through some mountain passes, and at last suddenly sees the garden-like valleys of Imphalna and the glittering temples. The domes, the vast plains, all covered with wisps of battle smoke, gave him a grim joy and a relief from the fatalism that so often haunted him.
Because in Duncan.According to Burner-Walker, Imphal is a battle straight out of "Song of the Great God".He is not a veteran of Asian issues, but as an educated British soldier, he is familiar with the Far East.He believes that Americans are pitifully ignorant of the strategic thinking formed by China, and that their huge effort to open up a corridor in northern Burma by pushing the British into it is a futile waste of life.a waste of resource.In the long run it doesn't really matter who wins at Imphal.The Japanese were slowly weakening under the attack of the US military in the Pacific. At that time, they had no strength to attack India in depth.The Chinese did not fight at all under Chiang Kai-shek.Chiang was concerned with holding off the Chinese Communists in the north.Once the war was over, Gandhi's fractious nationalist movement was somehow trying to keep the British out of India.It was a harbinger of disaster, Burner-Walker thought.Things, however, had swirled into such a maelstrom; one had to fight.
As usual, talking to combatants on the front line is often worth a try.When Na-Wok ordered the pilots to gather in the big restaurant made of moso bamboo in Imphal, everyone was invited to give their criticisms, opinions and opinions.The hundreds of young people who assembled made a lot of reactions, especially some criticisms.
"General, there are red ants and black spiders here, and they are prone to infestation and dysentery," a Cockney voice came from the back seat. "The rations are insufficient, and you are sweating and itchy, and there are cobras. And everything else in this funny drama, none of that matters to us. All we ask, sir, is enough gas to fly combat patrols from morning till night. Isn't that too much to ask, sir? What's the portion?" This elicited murmurs and approbations, but Burner-Walker had to say that the airlift unit couldn't bring in that much fuel.
As the meeting went on, a comment emerged.This opinion has apparently been discussed for some time among the pilots.Japanese planes flew over the plains of Imphal to attack, coming and going through two passages between the mountains.The idea is, instead of taking off to chase the harassing enemy planes, immediately set up a patrol in the middle of those passages.Returning Japanese pilots either encountered superior Spitfires in these narrow passages, or crashed due to engine failure or lack of fuel while trying to escape over the mountains.Burner-Walker seized on this opinion and ordered it to be carried out.He promised to improve various other depletions—if not fuel depletion—and flew away amidst cheers.On this return voyage, he disappeared in a thunderstorm.
It was a week of agony for Pamela before she heard news from Imphal that some villagers had brought him back alive.During that same week, Pug's letter arrived from New Delhi in a late batch of personal letters.She worked for the Deputy Commander of Tactical Air Forces and was busier than usual.The disappearance of Burner-Walker was tormenting her heart.She was his fiancée, so she became the center of concern and sympathy for everyone on the base.These pages, typewritten on the letterhead of the Jeffersonville Plaza Motor Inn, seemed to have come from another world.For Pamela, the reality of everyday life at this time was Comilla, a hot and musty Bengali town two hundred miles east of Calcutta, its walls filthy and rotting from the monsoon, its leaves almost as As lush as the jungle's foliage, its main feature is a handful of clustered memorials to British officials killed by Bangladeshi terrorists, and its army headquarters is filled with Asian faces.
Jeffersonville, Indiana!What is this place like?What kind of people are there?The name is similar to Victor.Henry himself was so much alike--square, lonely, American, unattractive, yet sublimely "Jeffersonian" in it.Pamela was both amused and bewildered by Pug's proposal, and the letter's matter-of-fact account of the financial situation and its clumsy brevity of admiration.It was very affectionate, but she could not take it seriously at this troubled time, so she did not write a reply.As she thought of the letter in the ensuing hustle and bustle after Burner-Walker's return, it seemed to her less and less likely to be real.In fact, she couldn't trust Rhoda.Henry will pull off this newest trick with flying colors.And all this happened in such a far away place!
Burner-Walker was flown to Comilla after spending several days in the hospital in Imphal.His clavicle was broken, both ankles were completely shattered, and he was still suffering from a high fever.Worst of all (at least in appearance) were festering wounds from leech bites.Sadly telling Pamela that he had done it himself, he pulled the leech off his body and let the head break off just under his skin.It wasn't that he didn't know it, but when he regained consciousness, he was lying on a swamp, his military uniform was almost completely torn, and swarms of fat black leeches surrounded him.Dazed with fright, he pulled them up quickly, remembering the rule only afterwards, that they should suck up their blood and leave on their own.He said the plane spun down, but he managed to level it down from the treetops and crash slowly.After waking up, he found his way through the jungle to a river bed, and walked staggeringly along the river bed for two days before meeting the villagers.
"Honestly, I've been pretty lucky," he told Pamela.He was lying on a hospital bed with bandages on, his pale and smiling face swollen from the trauma of the leech bite, so bloodless that it was frightening. "They say cobras bite heads. They could have eaten my head; nobody could be smarter than them. They're very merciful. Honestly, my dear, if I never saw another I don't care about a tree."
She spends hours at his bedside every day.He's low and emotionally dependent on her for love and encouragement.In the past, they were very close with affection, but at this time, they seemed to be really married.On the flight from New Delhi to London, Pamela finally wrote Pug a rather desperate letter.After two weeks in the hospital, Burner-Walker was sent home against his wishes for further treatment.She gave a detailed account of what had happened, explained her delay in writing, and said: Now, Pug, to your marriage proposal.I wrap my arms around your neck and bless you.I find it difficult to write, but the truth is, we can't.Duncan was very ill.I cannot abandon him.I like him very much, admire him, love him.He is a wonderful person.I never pretended to him—or to you—that strange love I felt for him that makes you and I inseparable.But I'm ready to cast aside enthusiasm, thinking it's no good.I'm having bad luck with this!
He never pretended either.At first, when he proposed to me, I asked him, "Why do you want me, Duncan?" He replied, with that shy, elusive smile, "Because you just fit me."
My dear, I really don't quite believe your letter.Don't be mad at me.All I know is that Rhoda hasn't got her new guy yet.Before he led her into a church.She's not over yet.There are many unexpected things!Someone else's unattainable wife may look very different from his own future spouse in the eyes of an old bachelor facing formal marriage.
You'd be happy to take Rhoda back anytime, and in fact I think you should, too.You can't be blamed for this in any way.I can't give you a Warren (Church education, I don't mind, you dear, but—); besides; whatever it is that brings us together, it's not like you and Rhoda There are so many traces of memories of the past.
I went over the hastily written paragraphs, finding it hard to believe my tear-filled eyes.
I love you, you know that.I will Always Love You.I've never known anyone like you.don't stop loving me.It's fate that keeps this whole thing from happening: bad timing, bad luck, and all kinds of restraints that interfere. But it's a good thing. When this damn war is over, let's continue to be good Friend. If Rhoda does marry that man, find an American beauty who will make you happy. My dear, there are as many beauties in your country as there are daisies in a meadow in June. You just never Didn't look around. Now, you can. But never forget your poor dear Pamela.